Archive | May, 2009

g i r l y . r o o m{we have some friends living with us while their house is being built, so i moved my office to make room for their daughter to have her own room. i just grabbed stuff that i had around the house {surprised to have found such girly things, since i have three boys}. if i ever do have a girl someday, i may go with this color scheme.}

grandma nonna has great style. i love everything she does to her house and most of anything ‘cool’ in my house is from her. so when her birthday comes around, i always want to find just the right gift for her. this year, i brainstormed {while drying my hair … you know, all good brainstorming happens in the bathroom} and came up with the perfect gift. they love to eat ice cream, but have about three bowls. for someone who adores dishes the way she does, i don’t really understand where all the bowls are. but we eat ice cream out of the three bowls and then move on to coffee mugs {she does have my favorite emma bridgewater one that really makes eating ice cream out of a coffee cup quite pleasant}. but they needed some bowls.

Our living room {family room, great room, everything room} is my favorite.You will see that I am not much of a color person {hence, my love of black, white & taupe}and this room is such a perfect reflection of my taste.A little girly, but with a houseful of boys, I had to keep it slightly masculine as well.

I A D O R E the linen couch, but I will admit, it is not practical. Neither are the chairs.Or the many pillows. Or the mirrored glass tables. Or the shell lamps.{hmm, it seems my house is not as practical as I once thought …}

I love decorating my mantel with little vignettes. They are ever-changing and make me happy. My mother-in-law is the greatest resource for anything cool, and this silver urn came from her. I have a thing for bridges and love this little wire one. On the other side is a framed sample of wallpaper from Farrow & Ball that I’m just dying to wallpaper my entry with.

My latest pillow endeavors included this darling one made of linen with a little silk flower on it.Cute, but again, not practical.

This is my favorite spot in the house. It is just a hallway, but I love the book pages wallpapered to the wall and the juxtaposition of all of my country accents on the modern table.

We get the most comments on our ‘chandelier’. It is from potterybarnand the little candle holders were found somewhere online {ask Ryan}.It looks great all lit up at night, although that rarely happens.

Since Ryan has lots of mountain rescue skills and can tie a mean knot,he had fun with this one. Hanging it, however, was not so fun.

When we moved into our new home, we knew right away what we wanted to do to the kitchen. But ripping out cabinets and painting over perfectly good ones when the house was mere months old? It sounded a little crazy to us. Then, we realized that it is our house and it should reflect us. Our style is not so much medium wood color with terrible bumpy porcelain tile and contemporary lighting. We did the best with what we had until we finally had the energy, ideas and funds to do a little facelift.

Here is what the kitchen looked like before:

and after:

We painted the lower cabinets glossy white, took out the upper cabinets
{ms. laundry room thanks us for mr. kitchen’s generous donation}
and turned our standard-builder kitchen into our own cottage/industrial style.

The island was re-shaped to give us more counter space as well as this
great little bookshelf to hold cookbooks and the all-important kid cooking gear.

The little beverage cooler is one of our favorite things about the kitchen.
We thought it would be a great place to put kid’s drinks, snacks, etc.,
but look closely and you’ll see who has taken it over.